Can good exist and be seen, without evil?

Question

We say things are black and white. What are they if there is no black? Without a contrast to go by, is good visible? Would we grow in the same way, if there was no example of evil? Tell me what you think.

Answer 1

I agree. In order for there to be good, there must also be evil. I also think this problem is why people who live really good lives aren't always happy. Not sure how I can explain that, but it's a hunch.

Answer 2

Yes, good can exist without evil. You don't need a contrast in one area to see opposite effects in another. If I had never been in the dark, I would still know what daylight is. I would have lived in it all my life. I could show it to you, explain it to you, but never quite appreciate it the way I would if I had spent time in the dark. It does effect the way we grow because the knowledge of good and evil means that we are forced to make a choice. If we were absent of choice, then we would also be absent of a genuine and sincere response. We would only react like a pre-programed machine.

Answer 3

Only humans have a concept of good or evil, because we have highly evolved brains.

An animal doesn't consider anything good or evil. It only considers certain situations good or bad. If it is a situation that allows the animal to gain an advantage, like food or mating, the animal thinks of the situation as good. If the animal encounters a situation as a disadvantage in its struggle to live and reproduce (as do all living things) it will deem the situation bad.

Humans are different. We don't just judge individual circumstances. We are able to think about the future and plan for it, so we developed religions and morals that helped us organize our societies. Without such organization and such morals, we would be just like animals constantly fighting amongst ourselves for every scrap of food or every potential mate. And from the morals and religions came the concepts of good and evil.

Answer 4

This is an interesting question that is positively shown in the making of the bible. Without the devil and his works, would we appreciate God and his works as much as we do? Not likely. There is no way to stamp out evil anyway, because when you do it will just be another lesser evil to stamp out, and so on and so on until we end up stepping on eachother's toes trying to end what we think is "evil". I hope this makes sense. :D

Answer 5

In this physical universe, nothing exists without the opposite. This is a world of relativity, a world of dichotomy. For good to exist, there must necessarily be evil. Likewise, up , down; man,woman;beautiful, ugly; God,Satan etc

Answer 6

I understand your point, but I see no reason why we need evil. If you're eating something delicious, for example, that doesn't mean you have to eat raw sewage before you can appreciate the taste of something good. A gentle caress would feel good even if nobody ever kicked the living daylights out of you. And so on.

Answer 7

This is the old "why does God permit evil " arguement. But the fact is, without evil there would be no need for the term "good" because everything would be good.

Answer 8

You wouldn't be able to recognize Good without having something to compare it to. I don't believe we would grow in the same way. In many ways, we would be very naive... innocently naive. Which isn't bad, but I don't think we would have advanced the way we have if "black" wasn't present.

Answer 9

is good defined by evil, or is evil defined by good? now thats the question.

if the 2nd option, then yes we can have good without evil. if evil is lack of good, much like cold is lack of heat(there is really no such thing as cold, everything requires heat) and dark is lack of light,

then there is no evil, just lack of good, possibly lack of Godly influence

Answer 10

Yes it's true, yin and yang and all that. Good cannot be understood without evil because they define each other.